Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Emily Alice Wilson. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Emily Alice, appreciate you joining us today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?
I’m producing two documentaries right now. One, Transcendence, is currently in distribution and premiered at the Out On Film 2024 Festival. Transcendence is the story of seven atlanta based transgender individuals and their journey to self discovery. This project is really important to me because the interviewees are my close friends who deserve to have their voices heard and validated. One of my best friends, Alice, transitioned while I was living abroad, so this project has been a really big part of us reconnecting and getting to know her better as her true self.
The second documentary is in post production and is called ALFA Rising, ALFA stands for the Atlanta Lesbian Feminist Alliance. ALFA was an organization in the 70s and 80s that worked in activism at the same time as civil rights, women’s liberation, and gay liberation. The women we interviewed made significant strides for women and queer people in Atlanta and all over the USA. Through this project I’ve been learning a lot about how to build a community like ALFA and my hope is that others will see this film and feel empowered to start organizations similar to ALFA to help foster a stronger sense of community.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I started editing when I was 12 years old because I had an option to either write an essay or make a video for a final project in school. I didn’t want to write an essay so I made the video instead and thus my journey as a video editor began. From there, I started getting clients making event videos for graduations, birthdays, and other big life moments. I starting making my first narrative short films when I was 14 as well. I decided to go to school at Georgia State University for Film, Media, and Entrepreneurship. I graduated with my Georgia Film Academy and Avid Media Composer certifications in 2020 and my BA in 2021 . I received the Main Street Entrepreneurs Seed Fund grant in 2021 and used the funding to grow my video editing and production business, mainly making short form social media content, which I still do today. After growing enough connections in the industry, I decided to use the funds from my client work to put towards indie film productions, including narrative short films and documentaries. I hope to continue to work on impactful documentary projects moving forward and have successful festival runs with my current projects.
Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?
I want to emphasize the important of grant funding in the business and creative world. I never though much about grants, but realized recently that a large part of my funding and growth has come from grant programs. In Atlanta, there are so many great grant and mentorship programs that are often free and easy to be a part of. Some that I went through are the Main Street Entrepreneurs Seed Fund Grant Program, the Atlanta Tech Village incubator program, and the Fulbright grant program. In the last year, my documentary team and I have been applying to secure more grant funding specific to documentary film projects and resources such as Women Make Movies, Atlanta Film Society, Film Impact Georgia, and the Georgia Production Partnership are my go tos for finding such resources.
Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.
I think art often gets written off as unproductive or less than when comparted to other career fields. Its important to remember that all fields draw from art and the line between art, science, math, and other fields are a lot blurrier than you would imagine. For example, in my video editing and animation work I have to do math when working with 2D and 3D graphs. I work with the x, y, and z planes in all of my animation projects. I have to understand physics and coding when editing parameters and adding motion. And even in projects where I don’t incorporate as much science and math, I still want to emphasize the impact art has on culture, history, and wellbeing.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://ekatproductions.weebly.com/
- Instagram: @ekatproductions
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emily-alice-wilson/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ekatproductions4984
- Other: Transcendence Trailer: https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-transcendence-amplify-trans-voices?qid=d0d2992eb07204480915010c71dfebb4
AFLA Rising: https://www.gofundme.com/f/alfa-risingfeature-film?qid=57f7683e4efc5c8e29237e29a0f0a348
